PM increasing Foreign Aid...

As i often say to people when they complain about govts actions, shut up and pay your taxes

She will face a revolt

God forbid we help out those most in need in the world.

It will turn out that it includes some military operations. Or else.

we are a wealthy country - only right we should lead the world in humanitarianism. well done Mrs May

Direct foreign remittances is about twice the UK government foreign aid budget. The free market has got this covered.
Quite why T May wants to continue to take people to court to collect taxes so that the compulsory sector spunks money on foreign development aid is a mystery, only explained by the phrase 'virtue signalling'.

To quote from an abstract on studies of foreign development aid:

"Abstract: Foreign aid provides a windfall of resources to recipient countries and may result in the

same rent seeking behaviour as documented in the “curse of natural resources” literature. In this

paper we discuss this effect and document its magnitude. Using panel data for 108 recipient

countries in the period 1960 to 1999, we find that foreign aid has a negative impact on institutions.

In particular, if the foreign aid over GDP that a country receives over a period of five years reaches

the 75th percentile in the sample, then a 10-point index of democracy is reduced between 0.5 and

almost one point, a large effect. For comparison, we also measure the effect of oil rents on political

institutions. We find that aid is a bigger curse than oil"

We should stick to tackling communicable diseases, humanitarian/disaster relief, and scrap the rest. We really really should do that.

A_T, are really that stupid?. or just hoping to rise a row. In a time of austerity and rising deficits, we gave 351 million to Pakistan, last year, (the lions share) and 150 million to India. Has it escaped you notice that both these nations have spent untold millions on developing and maintaining nuclear weapons!, oh an btw they are doing likewise in their respective "space programs" development.

India recently spent 135 million on 'high altitude" clothing alone for their troops, on duty in the 'super high-altitude' areas like the Siachen Glacier-Saltoro Ridge region,  in the ongoing conflict (50 years and counting) in Kashmir, which has resulted in 47,000 civilians and police deaths since 1989, according to official figures, others claim it could be 3 times that figure......Have a guess how many millions this little spat has cost them both.

I can see how you and other fools think our foreign aid is being well spent on these 2 poor 'developing nations' perhaps our money went on helping them buy a few boats, Last year Pakistan announced it would buy eight new submarines at a cost of around £4 billion,

300 million of british taxpayers money is being handed out to Pakistanis on pre-loaded cash cards as part of a scheme dogged by claims of corruption. SO... they can spend billions on weaponry, Islamabad has unveiled a massive military spending plan, pumping £654 million into the defence budget this year – an 11 per cent boost to £6.7billion. but expect us fools to help feed their people, who by and large despise us and our way of life. Catch yourself on FFS!. FOREIGN AID, YOU REALLY THINK THAT'S WHAT IT IS.???

Good post bongo,
"We should stick to tackling communicable diseases, humanitarian/disaster relief, and scrap the rest. We really really should do that".

I'm not sure the 'Bleeding Hearts' on here do abstract.

A_T, drop in to you local food bank and tell the needy there all about our wonderful Foreign Aid.

You can bet your bottom Rupee that the same people applauding our ludicrous generosity on Foreign Aid will be the very same people complaining that our NHS/public services are starved for cash and need much extra funding.

A_T, drop in to you local food bank and tell the needy there all about our wonderful Foreign Aid.

there should be plenty for everyone in this country - but the system demands we have the poor. nothing to do with giving foreign aid -  just a convenient excuse for the ignorant

Apr 22, 2017 -- 12:46AM, scandanavian_haven wrote:

God forbid we help out those most in need in the world.

Looks like the Conservatives will be getting the votes of many previous "progressive" voters then with this Foreign Aid election pledge.

A_T is that you best shot, FFS, anyway have a good day I'm off out to enjoy this glorious day in this wonderful country. GL guys.

Good point alun, more to this than I thought. A_T and SH, can she rely on your vote.??

anyone who thinks if we stopped the foreign aid poverty in the UK would disappear is living in cloud cuckoo land. but it's so easy to blame our problems on foreigners

So the Conservatives aren't actually the 'nasty' party after all, as they are pledging to "help out those most in need in the world" and "lead the world in humanitarianism".

As one of the above contributor observes "Well done Mrs May". 

Tell your friends, tell the students, tell the Unions, tell the protestors, tell the Junior Doctors, tell the food bank users, tell BBC/C4/Sky/The Guardian. 

Every Labour/SNP 'swing-seat' or Marginal is clearly now in the gravest danger as a result of this Foreign Aid pledge which will surely have Generation Snowflake and the older 'progressives' cheering in the streets.

How on earth is Corbyn, a man whose worldview can be summarised in two words (Britain Last) going to be able to compete with this vote-winning pledge? He could maybe raise taxes by 20% all across the earnings bands, ALL of which could then be donated abroad.

FFS, I just went to shut this down and go out before racing starts. A_T you are missing the point entirely, Foreign aid has nothing to with foreigners, but is supposed to be helping fellow human beings in need. Which was my point about food banks.

You are delighted that successive governments have used taxpayers money in this Illusionary way, but dismiss what's right under your nose as ok, because it's the system? really!.

You have not addressed whether you think it's ok to give money to 2 nuclear powers with a space program battling each for the last 50 years.

I give up, ........NOW I really am off, great post again Alun.

Foreign Aid is a misnomer, if used correctly it should be called Human Aid. byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

African life expectancy has increased by nine years since 2000, according to this Daily Mail report I've just googled:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-3598617/UN-Life-expectancy-worldwide-increased-5-years.html

Some of that will be due to less war, I expect, but foreign aid leading to better health care, infrastructure and farming will have played a part too.

Lefties are always on about raising taxes to create a "fairer society" and at the merest slightest hint they might go up under the Tories, Labour and the leftie press were complaining about it.

That's a problem with things like this, who are they trying to convert? Left wingers are so conditioned into believing (wrongly) that Tories are evil people, they'll just mentally block it as a good act.

how much do we have to borrow and pay to hand out all these billions??

ps

Tereason May - I smell betrayal  ho ho

unless they do what we tell them to do it is pointless giving foreign aid.

foreign aid never gets seriously challenged, its not only politically correct, its "right on" in a narcissistic virtue-signalling kind of way.

and we all the know the very same people who gush about it, are the same people who would walk on the other side of the road to avoid the local homeless begging on the street

we are powerless to stop their misery and weakness and suffering unless they are prepared to listen, and change.

It's overpopulation I suppose that is the main problem in every country I suppose ?

Why does China not seem to have famines anymore when it was a regular thing for hundreds of years ?
Their success may be down to the one child policy , although they have abandoned that now .

The Chinese famine was caused by the collectivisation and subsequent mismanagement of agriculture under Mao Zedong. This system has failed spectacularly elsewhere the most recent being Zimbabwe.
The population explosion in many parts of the world puts everything on a knife edge and it only takes a drought somewhere to spark things off with potentially catastrophic results. One of the causes of the so called Arab Spring.